Cinderella, Kindness And Magic

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Cinderella

Cinderella, the Disney movie, is coming in March 2015. Watching the promos, I cannot wait. The movie trailer made me a little teary-eyed.

Really. I even surprised myself.

Just look at this glass slipper. And I don't even like heels!

However, the Fairy Godmother tells Cinderella, "You'll find they're really comfortable." Frankly, I never argue with a Fairy Godmother.

I felt like I was 15 years old again. Magical possibilities and right-overcoming-wrong made my heart soar. This Disney movie trailer has all the right effects of swelling music and sparkling magic combined with a timeless story.

The Disney Movie Trailer For Cinderella


Chosen For The Part Of Cinderella

As I watched the video trailer, I found myself thinking, gosh, Cinderella seems so familiar. Who is that young lady? Even her voice seemed familiar. Wait, wait, don't tell me...

Oh, of course, beautiful Rose from our beloved Downton Abbey. British accent and all. What a perfect choice for this Cinderella movie.

What a thrill it must have been for her to be chosen for the part. Can you imagine it? Getting the call that said, "Yes, you've been selected among thousands to play the part of Cinderella."

Lady Rose, Lily James the actress, aka Cinderella, gracefully and delightfully evokes a sense of youthful awe and magic. I find myself believing, if only for a moment – "it could happen" – that wonderful suspension of disbelief.

Kindness, Goodness And Magic

I love the emphasis on kindness in this movie. We could all use a lot more kindness in the world. Even the Dalai Lama XIV talks about it in this quote:

Be kind whenever possible.  It is always possible.

Cinderella's mother shares with her a secret - "have courage and be kind" - which is wonderful advice for all of us. I, for one, would like to see kindness "win" more often.

I'm not particularly disposed to the idea of a Prince Charming coming to save me, in any literal sense, but I can certainly enjoy a story about it. These fairy tales are a part of my growing up.

Fairy Tales And Archetype

Fairy tales are universally appealing. They are old stories that have been handed down across the centuries and are told over and over again.  Fairy tales have archetypal energies that speak to something universal within us.

Good wins over evil; right succeeds after being wrongly treated. Having these energies enacted right in front of us appeals to our collective subconscious.

In literature, an archetype is a typical character, an action or a situation that seems to represent such universal patterns of human nature.

Carl Jung, Swiss psychologist, argued that the root of an archetype is in the “collective unconscious” of mankind. The phrase “collective unconscious” refers to experiences shared by a race or culture. This includes love, religion, death, birth, life, struggle, survival etc. These experiences exist in the subconscious of every individual and are recreated in literary works or in other forms of art.

Story telling is an important part of who we are. The stories comfort and entertain us and we bond together by sharing a common story line, nodding in agreement over the plot and outcome.

Even the highly commercialized Disney empire, keeper of fairy tales during the past century, has scored “direct visceral hits” with films that have captured the “power and the melodrama of the stories in their original form." -Maria Tartar

Photo of Cinderella dressed in her ballgown to go the ball. Image from Disney poster for the movie.

Cinderella goes to the ball. 

Applying Universal Energy To Archetypal Energies

Students of The Radiance Technique® (TRT®), can direct energy to parts of the story that personally resonate for them. Every topic is touched on in Cinderella – the death of a family member, ideas of right and wrong, the downtrodden, love and redemption. Watching the movie while applying TRT® hands-on is a great way to stay centered and aware.

Maybe you have little ones who have to see the movie. TRT® hands-on during the movie is a great time to catch up on a little extra energy for you.

Relax And Enjoy The Show

Of course, it's also possible to enjoy the show and not worry about archetype or any other deeper meaning.  I like to sit back and use my TRT® hands-on to enhance relaxation and enjoyment of the movie.

As for me, I also have a small, magical ability to tell the future. I predict we will be seeing a lot of little girls in Cinderella costumes next Halloween.

 

Meditative Stillness In A Galloping World

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Meditative Stillness

 
“Meditation is the journey from movement to stillness,
sound to silence.”
— Sri Sri
 

A lovely meme from the The Art of Living organization reminds us of the meditative process of movement to stillness.

However, because our lives are not a straight line, but rather an ongoing spiral – meditation also takes us back again from stillness to movement.

We are always in motion, but the balance between stillness and movement often becomes askew.

Our Modern To-Do List

Our modern lives are stuffed full of activities all the time. I'll bet you noticed. Upload a photo on Facebook, make sure you tweet something, email, text, call someone, watch a video. In the meantime you should also follow everyone else's Facebook posts, tweets, emails and texts.

Go to the workplace: work, work, work. 

Go back home: sleep, sleep, sleep.

Go out, go in, go to, go from... go, go, go.

Hurry up and work. Hurry up and sleep. Get up and do it all over again.

Stillness does not rank high on the to-do list.

Do More With Less

In the workplace, the dreaded phrase "do more with less" is used to justify squeezing more work out of you with less staff and resources to support the workload. Instead of being a terrible thing that should be corrected, "do more with less" has become a workplace badge of honor.

"I work 16 hours a day!" co-workers yell as a battle-cry, "Look at me, that must mean I'm important!"

It's incredible how skilled we are at turning things inside-out and backwards.

Caught in the dusty whirlwind of outer activity, I picture myself galloping like a horse from activity to activity, to yet another activity, and on and on, ad nauseum. Never stopping long enough to catch my breath, to gather my thoughts, or to look up at the bigger picture.

Galloping, galloping, galloping...

Have you noticed in our fast-paced world, there is never a lack of things to be galloping to or from?

Wild Horses Galloping

But we are not herds of wild horses thundering on the Great Plains; we are humans in search of our awakening. Part of that process involves stopping, sitting with stillness and holding space for awareness in our breath. As we master stillness, we learn to bring greater awareness to our "galloping." Galloping with awareness. In motion with consciousness.

All this galloping made me think of a popular song from my youth – Wildfire. In the old days of driving down country backroads in a 3-on-the-column Rambler, the AM radio blared and Wildfire was a top hit.


Michael Martin Murphey, the songwriter, tells us much of this song blossomed from a dream. In his Story Behind The Song 'Wildfire' he shares:

 
“The song came from deep down in my subconsciousness.
My grandfather told me a story when I was a little boy about a legendary ghost horse that the Indians talked about.
In 1936, author J. Frank Dobie identified this ghost horse story as the most prominent one in the lore of the Southwest.”
— Michael Martin Murphey
 

Murphey recognized the fluidity of the symbolism in the verses and wisely resisted trying to limit its interpretation, leaving it instead to each listener.

Some of the deeper meaning in this song has to do with cycles – how we come and go from this planet. The hoot owl can be a harbinger not just of death, but of a great transition.

An aging, weathered farmer comes to the end of his life and he rides freely in the wind with Wildfire. The name Wildfire harkens to the inner fire burning brightly inside all of us.

 

Marsh Wren Competes With Van Damme

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A Marsh Wren And The Joys Of Nature

This humble marsh wren is certainly talented. He sings at the top of his voice. With gusto, as they say. All this, while doing the splits on cattail reeds.

No one can accuse this little bird of not fully participating in the moment.

Jean Claude Van Damme In Epic Volvo Ad

When I saw the marsh wren tweet by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service – Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge in Utah – I couldn't help but think of the Jean-Claude Van Damme video with his epic splits on two Volvo trucks. Van Damme's splits are crazy impressive, but I must say this little marsh wren is giving him some competition.

Personally, I find Van Damme's splits compelling at the age of 53. The Volvo advertisement picked a captivating choice of music, Only Time, by Enya. Two perfectly positioned 18-wheeler Volvo trucks roll smoothly backwards with early light gleaming off golden paint as the sun rises across the landscape of Spain.

Impressive.

I Confess, I Used To Drive A Volvo

To be honest, I'm probably a bit partial to the Van Damme/Volvo video because I drove a Volvo S-40 T5 AWD for nine years, that I first picked it up in Germany.

I drove that Volvo all over Europe for 4 wonderful years. What an awesome piece of machinery on the German Autobahn. I definitely miss driving 100 mph in the early morning on an empty, silent Autobahn that had no speed limit. But, that's a story for another time.

Traveling the highways in Europe, I was always a bit surprised to look up to see big rigs with the mark of Volvo or Mercedes Benz. I'm used to seeing those marks on cars in the U.S. – but not on long haul, transport trucks.

In the video, Volvo shows off the impressive and steady precision of its big rigs.

Back to the topic of splits – I dutifully acknowledge anyone who can do the splits, no matter the species. Between the two of them, Van Damme and the marsh wren, I'm not sure which one has outdone the other.

Here's a link to the song of a Marsh Wren so you can be alerted when one is near and perhaps observe its lovely splits.

 

The Unseen Hand Of God

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Clunking While Geese Are Soaring

A cold evening spilled out across the darkening land as I dutifully dragged myself along in my requisite exercise-jog.

I was distracted from my discomfort when I spied a flock of Canadian geese in an open field. Finished with their eventide grazing, they lifted en masse into a pale wintery sky.

Strong wings beat up and down as they rose higher and higher. The strokes of their wings were audible as their feathers pushed against the cold night air. They gathered together across the icy blue expanse and eventually became a single line.

One goose dropped lower, slowed down a bit and then, rose back up into the line to take its place behind another.

Who would know why?

Held By The Unseen Hand Of God

My heart ached as I watched their flight. Joy and pain tumbled within me.

It looked like so much work to flap those wings over and over to keep them skimming across the wide expanse of atmosphere. Nothing else holding them up except, perhaps, the unseen hand of God.

From my awkward and earthbound state, I was reminded how brutish and dull I am in comparison to their lightness of being.

Watching their skyward journey, I held them in my heart as they traveled their sky-path.

An Overgrown, Wild Place

The honking call from their white-slashed throats resonated to an overgrown, wild place tucked inside my heart.

Like my fellow humans across the centuries, I found myself wishing that I could fly, free of metal or mechanics.

With all our technology, there is nothing we do that comes close to their level of mastery, grace, and elevated simplicity.